The Fixing the Pittsburgh Penguins Need

The Pittsburgh Penguins were ready to make their 17th straight playoffs, but after a collapse in the last couple of games, the consecutive playoff streak ended at 16 years. To put that into perspective, Sidney Crosby has played 18 seasons, and it’s his first time not in the playoffs since his ROOKIE YEAR. Changes had to be made and shortly after the regular season ended the Penguins started the change by firing their entire front office, in the likes of Ron Hextall (GM), Brian Burke (President of Hockey Ops), and Chris Pryor (AGM).

This is just the beginning for the Penguins and their re-tool, as they need to find a completely new front office. The currents names that have popped up in reports are Erik Tulsky, who currently works as the assistant GM for the Carolina Hurricanes, Kyle Dubas who was recently announced was not returning as the GM to the Toronto Maple Leafs, Mathieu Darche from the Tampa Bay Lighting, and Dan MacKinnon of the New Jersey. These people that have been named, are who FSG wants in a GM, a data-driven GM. Again this is just the start of the re-tool, they still need to resign and acquire players.

The Penguins own their first lottery pick (14th overall pick) since 2012, will they use it, or will they trade it? They have around 20 Million dollars in cap space and will like to use it. And with the core of Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, and Kris Letang aging, but aging like fine wine, they might look to trade it for immediate help. Right now the Penguins are a fringe playoff team at best, so any help is good help… right? Wrong, the Ron Hextall-led penguins last year wanted immediate help and they tried getting that with Mikael Granlund, who they acquired with a second-round pick. This trade not only showed how unaware Hextall was of the team's needs but also shows that some “help” is not good help.

The real question to ask is what do the Penguins need in order to make them a Stanley Cup contender again? With this 14th overall pick, one should see the Penguins, at least mulling over the idea of trading it, but only for the right price. Some teams looking for a solid pick in the draft are the Vancouver Canucks, who hold the 11th pick, Arizona who holds the 6th and the 12th overall picks, and maybe even Winnipeg, who looks like a team heading into a rebuild. With the Penguins, they have a few restricted and non-restricted free agents that they need to resign, a couple of notable ones are winger, Jason Zucker who is coming off a solid year and goaltender Tristan Jarry, who has been dealing with injuries the past couple of seasons. Jason Zucker will want roughly the same as he made the past couple of seasons (5.5 mil), maybe a bit less given his history of injuries, with that the Penguins should resign him, but with Tristan Jarry, it is a whole different story. The Penguins could sign him for a more team-friendly deal after a disappointing and injury-riddled year, but when he is healthy, he looks like a Vezina-caliber goalie, but they would be betting on him to stay healthy. They could look into trading for a goalie, with the future of Conner Hellybuck in Winnipeg up in the air, the Penguins could look to trade for him or go after a younger goalie in Karel Vejmelka of the Arizona Coyotes. Both are solid options, but given the depleted prospect pool it would be a bit hard to get Hellybuck so trading the 14th pick for him would be inevitable, but they would also have to add a couple of other assets.

The Penguin's bottom six this past year could not put the puck in the back of the net, and their defence was sub-par at best; they will need to build around a couple of players and get rid of some if they can (due to their cap). A guy like Brock Boeser is what the Penguins need in a top-nine guy, a younger player who has term and his trade value is at his lowest; they can even possibly get him with retained salary, which could be enticing. A couple of offensive players that Pittsburgh could look to sign are, 1) A former Penguin in Jordan Staal, a player who is great at faceoffs and can kill penalties. 2) J.T. Comphere, coming off a career year, will look to get a raise in his paycheck, but they have the money to spend. 3) Max Domi, they have been linked to him for many years, is this the year they finally get him? Now for defence, the Penguins defence struggled mightily this past year, and it does not help when they can not stay healthy. Brian Dumoulin who had his best offensive season in his career was one of their worst defensive players. Jan Ruuta who they just signed last year struggled throughout the year, and Jeff Petry had his moments but rarely. Ron Hextlal did a horrible job addressing the defensive needs; but here are a couple of players the new front office should look into that could fix it. 1) Ryan Graves 2) Carson Soucy 3) Scott Mayfield, what do these players all have in common? They all stayed healthy, 78 games were played for Graves and Soucy and for Mayfield, he played all 82.

The Penguins need to shake things up a bit, they need to make that big trade or those signings that make sense and help their needs; not sign a player just for the fact of signing someone @Ron Hextall; or they will have to enter the scary times of a rebuild, a time where a lot of Penguins fans have yet to see. It will be a very interesting off-season for the Pittsburgh Penguins but it will be a more nervous time for Penguins fans across the world.